rest-node-ts

A Node.js TypeScript template for building RESTful APIs. This repository provides a solid foundation with a structured project layout, essential middleware, and development scripts to get you started quickly.

Features

• TypeScript: Fully configured TypeScript setup for type safety and modern JavaScript features.
• Structured Layout: Organized directory structure for controllers, routes, middleware, and utilities.
• Environment Variables: Uses dotenv for managing environment-specific configurations.
• Development Ready: Uses tsx (tsx watch) for fast startup and automatic server restarts on file changes.
• Path Aliasing: Cleaner import statements (@/ maps to src/), resolved natively by tsx from tsconfig.json during development.
• Custom Logger: A simple, colorful console logger for different message types (info, success, warn, error).
• Essential Middleware:
  • cors: For enabling Cross-Origin Resource Sharing.
  • morgan: For HTTP request logging.
  • helmet: To help secure your Express apps by setting various HTTP headers.

Project Structure

src/
├── app.ts                  # Express app configuration and middleware setup
├── server.ts               # Server entry point
├── config/
│   └── env.ts              # Environment variable configuration
├── controllers/
│   └── sampleController.ts # Example controller logic
├── middleware/
│   └── errorHandler.ts     # Basic error handling middleware
├── routes/
│   └── sampleRoutes.ts     # Example route definitions
└── utils/
    └── logger.ts           # Custom logging utility

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js (v20.0.0 or higher recommended)
• pnpm package manager

Note: pnpm commands can be replaced by npm and yarn.

Installation

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/aulanchik/rest-node-ts.git
   cd rest-node-ts

2. Install dependencies:

   pnpm install

3. Set up environment variables: Create a .env file in the root directory by copying the example file:

   cp .env.example .env

   Open the .env file and specify a PORT:

   PORT=8080

   If no port is specified, the server will default to port 3000.

Available Scripts

Run in Development Mode

To start the server with automatic restarts on file changes, run:

pnpm dev

This runs tsx watch src/server.ts. The server will be accessible at http://localhost:<PORT>.

Note: tsx does not type-check your code. To check types, run npx tsc --noEmit.

Build for Production

To compile the TypeScript code into JavaScript in the dist/ directory:

pnpm build

Start Production Server

To run the compiled application (make sure you have run pnpm build first):

pnpm start

API Endpoints

This template includes a sample endpoint to demonstrate the structure.

• GET /
  • Description: Returns a simple JSON message.
  • Response:

    {
      "message": "This is a sample endpoint."
    }